It has a bit of everything with a nearly 90 GB library of a 109-piece orchestra which includes some heavy-hitting percussion and a steam synthesizer. Albion One by Spitfireįor anyone interested in creating music for media, Albion One is a terrific starting point. With that, here are a few of my favorite tools for composing music.

I would also like to point out that while this article focuses on composing for visual media, the music for podcasts and certain radio programming can be “cinematic” in nature. When composing for projects with restrictive budgets, I’ll write for and then track the organic instruments that I am proficient at, this includes acoustic and electric guitar, bass, piano and other keyboard-based instruments, as well as various percussion, and then I’ll fill out the arrangement using my collection of virtual instruments, my favorites of which I’ll be discussing beneath.īefore I do that, however, may we take a moment to appreciate the incredible standard of quality to which virtual instruments have risen? I recall the quality of tools I had installed on my very first computer-based music production system, and today’s software is nearly incomparable in terms of sound quality, playability, and user interface design.Ĭompanies like Native Instruments and Spitfire display tireless devotion to creating tools designed to be used by top professionals during the production of widely-distributed media, and they deserve our praise. While one could argue the collaborative spark is missing from music from today’s scores that were created by smaller teams, if not individuals, this new system is undoubtedly faster, cheaper, and simpler.

I’ve worked on plenty of indie films and advertisements as the sole musician and engineer. For better or for worse, the teams that work on music for visual media are generally smaller these days. Music from the Golden Age of Hollywood was reliant on expansive teams - composers, arrangers, copyists, music editors, players, engineers and more each played their role in creating the memorable scores from when the Hollywood Studio System dominated cinema.Īs technology crept into the frame - digital recording, MIDI, sampling - no longer did we need a battalion of talented individuals to generate music scores. This is a great time for anyone interested in creating music for visual media, whether it be films, television, games, or advertisements.

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